A 28-year-old mother identified as Asienjo Joyce has been arrested for abandoning her three-day-old child at the border town of Nimule in Eastern Equatoria State.
According to local authorities, the woman gave birth, abandoned the baby, and tried to hide before she was arrested.
Major David Khasmiro, the inspector of police in Nimule Town Council said the woman refused to cooperate with the police and is not talking to investigating officers but is being kept in prison until she is arraigned in court.
“There is a woman we arrested and transferred to prison because it is negligence. She left a three-day-old child after she gave birth and disappeared,” he said. “The child cried for two days and was helped while the mother was being searched for. The child was taken to hospital and the woman was found, arrested, and brought to the police. We said this woman will not be released because it is negligence.”
Maj. Khasmiro added: “We arrested her and she will be taken to court to face charges but in the meantime, she has been transferred to prison awaiting trial.”
The police officer warned women against abandoning newly born babies.
“The woman is called Asienjo Joyce, 28, South Sudanese from the Madi tribe. She has a husband who even came up to the police station and went back because investigations are ongoing,” he explained. “There must be something wrong because the woman has completely refused to give a statement. The husband even denied that he has a problem with his wife.”
For her part, Dominica Idwa Vitale, the Director General at the Eastern Equatoria State Ministry of Gender, Child and Social Welfare, condemned the act of abandoning a newborn and said the mother should not use family problems to victimize the innocent child.
“If there was a problem, she should have been patient at least until the child reaches a month or more then she would have called the family and told them her problems,” she said. “They should talk and find out where the problem is and resolve matters. No one can resolve his or her problems alone and now she went to punish the innocent child which is very wrong.”
Meanwhile, Lachimi Rose Tukai, the women’s activist and the Executive Director of Women Initiative for Humanitarian Development Organization (WIHDO), believes some reasons led to the woman abandoning her baby. The activist faulted the mother for what she described as an inhuman act.
“Maybe there is a problem between this woman and her husband because a woman cannot abandon a child after three days. The family should investigate the husband and the wife and find out what happened,” she said. “Maybe the husband was not providing food for the child and the woman took it as a burden and got fed up with giving birth to only one gender. If this woman knows the importance of a child, she will not do this.”
“I really appreciate the police who took this woman into custody for safe keeping and they can also find out if she has mental problems,” Tukai added.